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The Power of a Lie

Chapter 32: Transcriber’s Note
By Johan Bojer
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About This Book

The narrative follows a respected townsman who signs his name as guarantor for a friend; when the friend becomes insolvent the guarantor denies the bond and accuses the friend of forgery, leading to the innocent man's imprisonment while the guilty man is publicly honored. The story traces how the initial deception reverberates through families and the community, reshaping reputations, consciences, and relationships. Character studies expose how self-justifying falsehoods can harden or unexpectedly soften a personality, and how suspicion corrodes integrity. The novel explores moral ambiguity, the irrevocable consequences of lies, and the social mechanisms that reward deceit and punish truth.

Transcriber’s Note

This transcription is based on two sets of images posted by the HathiTrust Digital Library. The first, digitized by Google from a copy made available by the University of Minnesota, is available at:

hdl.handle.net/2027/umn.31951001153970w

The second, digitized by the Internet Archive from a copy made available by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, is available at:

hdl.handle.net/2027/uiuo.ark:/13960/t7fq9th7f

Images of this copy are also available through the Internet Archive:

archive.org/details/poweroflie00boje

Note that the scans of the copy from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign do not include the introduction by Hall Craine.

The following changes were made to the printed text:

  • p. 2: “I shall soon be keeping nalf the parish,” he thought.—Changed “nalf” to “half”.
  • p. 45: she turned and threw her arms about, his neck.—Deleted the comma after “about”.
  • p. 100: He had at first, therefore, half unconciously wished—Changed “unconciously” to “unconsciously”.
  • p. 100: whether they called themselves farmers or mercnants—Changed “mercnants” to “merchants”.
  • p. 120: ‘But suppose sentence is passed on Wangen—Changed opening single quotation mark to a double quotation mark.
  • p. 120: And he seated himself upon the edge of her bed. with the light in his hand.—Deleted the period after “bed”.
  • p. 136: And was Einar now going up to con- contradict her before all these people?—Deleted “con-”, which occurs at the end of a line.
  • p. 177: “Talk hold of my hand, Henry!”–Changed “Talk” to “Take”.
  • p. 192: “Here it s Karen!”—Changed to “Here it is, Karen!”
  • p. 219: a little way up the the table—Deleted the second “the”.
  • p. 230: Mountain and lake lay in a great calm peace—Added a period to the end of the sentence.

Inconsistencies such as the two different spellings of “mustn’t” and the inconsistent italicization of “sæter” have been preserved.